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MEMBER DIARY

WI-3’s 3rd Option on Jobs and Trade

The following letter appeared in Friday’s edition of the Hudson Star-Observer. My comments are interspersed through out.

Corporations are sending our jobs overseas because it is profitable for them to do so. We must make it unprofitable. Before it started taxing the sweat off our backs the federal government obtained most of its tax dollars from tariffs and excise taxes. Now, they tax our labor or assess fees at an ever-increasing rate while snooping into the most private parts of our lives. Enough!

Where’s the data to back up your statement? What data can Mr. Krsiean point to that demonstrates what brought about the trade deficit the United States has with other countries? Mr. Krsiean talks about the high taxes paid by businesses and laborers. While on paper, businesses pay taxes, the reality is the consumer is the one who ultimately pays corporation taxes through higher higher prices for goods and services.

I’m promoting the following solutions:

1. We make it cost prohibitive to outsource our jobs overseas. We do this through a taxation structure that:

(a) Rewards in-country manufacturing with lower taxes and less regulation

(b) Increases taxes on profits our U.S. held corporations earn and stuff into offshore accounts from foreign sales of their foreign manufactured goods

(c) Significantly increases tariffs on imported goods

(d) Increases or establishes taxes on foreign outsourced services

What Krsiean proposes sounds more like fines than taxes. Not to mention isolationist in approach. Krsiean is too general with his itemized solution. How does he wish to go about rewarding businesses for keeping jobs in America with lower taxes and regulation, yet punish businesses for outsourcing and profiting from overseas ventures? What specific things does he propose? Does he have a detailed, well articulated plan?

2. We will slash taxes and eliminate the income tax/IRS after we slash government and pay off the national debt. Our labor becomes more competitive with other countries because our wage demands go down due to MUCH lighter tax load. We revert back to indirect taxation through tariffs and consumption taxes.

There are constitutional issues here. Krsiean wants to abolish the IRS. That will call for an amendment to repeal the 16th Amendment. Good luck trying to get that to become reality. I seriously doubt such an amendment to repeal the 16th Amendment would make it past congress – even with a Republican-controlled congress and a Republican President taking office on January 20, 2013. Furthermore, by what Krsiean is proposing, it seems as though he wants to escalate the trade deficit we have with China and other creditor nations holding our debt. Now is not the time to widen the trade deficit or espouse an isolationist stance that leads to trade wars. For instance, why would the U.S. want to charge Germany for importing BMW’s into the U.S. at a higher rate than what Germany charges for the U.S. to import a Ford into Germany. That doesnt’ make sense.

3. Deport illegal aliens that take our jobs and severely fine or put out of business companies that hire them.

This is easier said, than done. Illegal immigration is a problem, to be sure. However, the first thing that needs to be done with illegal immigrants taking American jobs is to secure the border. Once the border is secure, then the task of finding illegal immigrants employed without any verification that they can be in the United States legally can begin.

But above all, the best thing the U.S. government can do to help reinvigorate our economy and jobs growth is to get the heck out of our way and stop taxing and regulating us to death! The more they tax and regulate us, the more corporations must pay us and the less competitive we become. The government is a chain around our and our employer’s necks!

It’s nice to see Krsiean taking a John Galt approach regarding what the government’s role should be. Yet Krsiean says something that makes me scratch my head. “The more they [the government] tax and regulate us, the more corporations must pay us and the less competitive we become.” Huh? The more corporations must pay us? In the private sector, corporations don’t have to pay for more employees. Corporations lay people off in a declining economy. It’s as simple as that. Less business = less need for employees to fulfill business obligations.

I will actively promote the removal of obstacles and minimize taxation which government straps on businesses (as long as these businesses keep our jobs and financial accounts here at home) and thereby encourage new startups and jobs. At the same time I am an advocate of an updated, more responsive and more protective patent office organization to encourage small entrepreneurs to participate in business.

In summary, it looks like Mike Krsiean want to take a unilateral approach to trade with other nations. “It’s the U.S.’s way, or no way.” I understand and agree with the desire for the United States to have a trade surplus again, but engaging in a slash and burn strategy to close the trade deficit is not in the best interest America. The idea is to build the bridges of economic trade with other countries, not burn them. Mike Krsiean’s plan smacks of the latter, not the former.